Facebook to add new Clear History tool in coming months

Before taking the stage at Facebook’s F8 conference, CEO Mark Zuckerberg made one announcement ahead of time: the social network is adding a new feature called Clear History. It will be introduced alongside Facebook’s existing options for privacy control. “In your web browser, you have a simple way to clear your cookies and history. The idea is a lot of sites need cookies to work, but you should still be able to flush your history whenever you want,” Zuckerberg wrote. “We’re building a version of this for Facebook too. It will be a simple control to clear your browsing history on Facebook — what you’ve clicked on, websites you’ve visited, and so on.”

The first application of Clear History is directly tied to the Cambridge Analytica scandal. “Once we roll out this update, you’ll be able to see information about the apps and websites you’ve interacted with, and you’ll be able to clear this information from your account. You’ll even be able to turn off having this information stored with your account.” Facebook has announced numerous steps in recent weeks — directed at both everyday users and developers — meant to prevent third parties from gleaning an abundance of personal data from unknowing users.